Forensic veterinary examination of animals poisoned with Calypso® neonicotinoid

The paper presents the results of the authors experimental studies on the problem of forensic veterinary examination of animals in the poisoning with Calypso® such as drug characteristics, intoxication etiology, clinical aspects and pathomorphological changes, identification methods in biological material as well. Calypso® (thiacloprid) is a contact, intestinal systemic insecticide of the chlornicotinil class, which is widely applied for pest control on the majority of corn crops and vegetables in crop production. The ingestion of pesticides into the body of animals is possible when eating fodder and drinking water with residual amounts of the drug. Clinical characteristics of an acute poisoning include ataxia, atony of the gastrointestinal tract; tympany in ruminants; an acute gastrectasis in monogastric animals; impacted and over-filled crop in fowls; muscle tremor; antemortem tonic-clonic convulsion is recorded therewith. At pathological study of carcasses, serious regard must be paid to enlarged and over-filled stomach (crop in fowls), tympany, passive pulmonary, hepatic and renal congestion, cerebral hyperemia and dura mater hemorrhage as well. For the chemical-toxicological analysis, it is necessary to take intravital samples of food, water and blood; after death - gastric contents, a part of the liver, hair (or feather)-covering, lymph nodes. Residual amounts of thiacloprid in the biological material can be determined by TLC and HPLC techniques. Forensic veterinary examination of Calypso® poisoning in animals is arranged of a series of procedures including: the determination of insecticide application in farming; diagnosis of specific clinical symptoms (ataxia, gastric and intestinal atony, convulsions); postmortem examination findings (acute mammalian gastrectasis or enlarged crop in fowls, hydropic liver dystrophy in mammals and fatty degeneration in fowls), and determination of residual amounts of thiacloprid in carcass’ organs and tissues or in an animal that has undergone intoxication.